Ordinary metallurgy-- Implements
Besides their ornamental metallurgy, which has been treated of in a former chapter, the
Phoenicians
largely employed several metals, especially bronze and copper, in the fabrication
of vessels for ordinary use, of implements, arms, toilet articles, furniture,
&c. The vessels include pateræ, bowls, jugs, amphoræ, and
cups; the implements, hatchets, adzes, knives, and sickles; the arms, spearheads,
arrowheads, daggers, battle-axes, helmets, and shields; the toilet articles,
mirrors, hand-bells, buckles, candlesticks, &c.; the furniture, tall
candelabra, tripods, and thrones. The bronze is of an excellent quality,
having generally about nine parts of copper to one of tin; and there is
reason to believe that by the skilful tempering of the Phoenician metallurgists,
it attained a hardness which was not often given it by others. The Cyprian
shields were remarkable. They were of a round shape, slightly convex, and
instead of the ordinary boss, had a long projecting cone in the centre.
An actual shield, with the cone perfect, was found by General Di Cesnola
at Amathus, and a projection of the same kind is seen in several of the
Sardinian bronze and terra-cotta statuettes. Shields were sometimes elaborately
embossed, in part with patterning, in part with animal and vegetable forms.
Helmets were also embossed with care, and sometimes inscribed with the name
of the maker or the owner.